260223 Sat Jul 07 22:31:52 -0700 2001 4 26 International 0 1375392 We had two full days planned in Sintra with excursions into Lisbon. Our flight was grounded out of Bangor so our first night in Sintra was spent at the hotel at the Bangor airport. Got out of Bangor the next morning only to find our flight out of JFK to Lisbon had been cancelled. Our second night in Sintra was spent at a hotel near JFK. No Pasteis de nata in Belem for me. We picked up our car after getting out of Lisbon and spent the first few days in Guimaraes. Two meals stand out in that town: one because it was less than I had expected and the second was quite good. I’ll save the less good for last: In the Old City near the Largo da Oliveira is a place called Solar do Arco. I had a fish that was new to me called Dorado. It was grilled, crispy skin, and white, very sweet flesh. Plain, no sauce, perfectly cooked. I never saw it on another menu during the trip. Yukon gold colored potatoes along side were fine. My first Portugese mixed salad of the trip was at this meal: a very buttery Boston-type lettuce, sliced sweet white onion, and sliced red tomatoes that looked under ripe but were not, simply dressed with vinegar and that wonderful olive oil that I wiped up with my bread. Wine was the Vinho Verde, dry, and I would stick with that the whole trip. I loved it and the drier the better. The second meal was on our last night at the Pousada da Oliveira (a very welcoming and well run place to stay). The meal we chose was called tipico (?), meaning typical Portuguese cuisine, I surmised. This was the only meal where I had to restrain myself from licking the plate AND it was the most expensive meal of the trip. [It seemed that the less we spent, the better the food!] Don’t know that I’d call this a rule though. The plate had on it very big hunks of fried pork, little intestine looking things stuffed with something not unpleasant but very greasy, and a large blump of blood pudding. Nothing was unpleasant but it was way, way to heavy for me. We had a “tipico" carrot and nut cake for dessert. Too dry. The pousada was absolutely wonderful for breakfast, sort of snazzy service outside if one chose, but I think I’d take dinner elsewhere the next time. Perceves at the Paraxute were absolutely wonderful. But they were procured especially for us and I think are hard to come by so far inland. This is peculiar, since I have no name for this tiny place, but it’s indicative of the wisdom of following one’s chowhound nose, if the vibes are right. This would remain among my favorite meals of the trip. We stopped for just a bite on the way back from a day on the road at this little place that seemed to be between serving times. We were pretty bedraggled from a long day and the lovely lady who ran the place offered us a sandwich with pork (actually she said “meat” but it was pork). Her English was almost non-existent, but way better than our Portuguese! She also threw together an amazingly beautiful and delicious salad. It was like being in someone’s home. And she delighted in practicing her English. The Portuguese KNOW how to cook pork. The bread was crusty outside and tender and fragrant inside. The pork, oh that pork! It was moist, meltingly tender, and redolent of garlic, hacked off of a larger piece back in the kitchen and piled into our rolls. Sorry I don’t have a name for you all. I didn’t even see one on the building. We had first stopped at a cafe across the street and they had shooed us over to this little place. Enough for now. But I’ll be back with more. pat Sat Jul 07 22:31:52 -0700 2001 0 pat hammond 1 1375409 I see you have tried Percebes,... Out of season! You may have been the unwitting accessory in a crime against shellfish. Percebes are normally only consumed in the winter months as like just about everything else that comes in a shell they taste better when their habitat is cooler. The Percebes' habitat is an important part of their legend. They live on the breakwater between steep rocky land and the constantly pounding north-western sea. The colonization of this most inhospitable niche makes their collection fraught with risk. A risk further complicated by the anachronistic and protective regulations that govern their gathering. They must be harvested from the land and not the sea, so no scuba-gear and no boats. Young men descend the sheer cliff-faces on ropes and are jigged up and down between the breaking waves selecting and collecting two or three at a time before having to be hauled out of the way of the surf. It can take an exhausting and dangerous hour to collect a couple of kilos, and tens of piscators die or are seriously injured each year. The piquancy of death so beloved of the Catholic Iberians adds to the caché of Percebes, and along with the laborious nature of their collection means their prices can top fifty pounds a kilo. The best Percebes come from Galicia in Northwest Spain. When buying choose unwrinkled short fat specimens, by short I mean about three cm and by fat, a centimetre in diameter. Make sure that there are no rocks attached to them as fifty pounds a kilo for rock is pretty steep. Percebes should be boiled, if possible, in fresh seawater. Wait for the water to boil throw them in and when the water returns to the same rolling boil drain and serve. An indispensable item for the eating of Percebes is a napkin tied around the neck, otherwise you use only your hands. First make an incision with your teeth in the leathery neck of the beast and suck out the juice, then from the incision you just made, tear open the skin and eat the fleshy stem. One of the great European gastronomic experiences. Tue Jul 10 04:33:06 -0700 2001 1375392 0 Michael Lewis 2 1375414 I seriously doubt that I had boot-legged barnacles, Michael. They were on many menus and I had them again on the Costa Nova at a very nice restaurant called Marisqueira, famous up and down the strip for seafood. And they weren't served from under the table, they were on the menu. We saw them everywhere. While we were in Porto at the one of the Port Lodges, I got into a conversation with the young man who introduced us to their product. He told me that on the weekends he'd dive for them, use what he could, and sell the rest. The method we were shown for eating them worked very well. Take hold of the shell, twist and pull. You can then suck the juice out of the membranous sleeve, which remains whole, and bite the juicy morsel away from then shell. There's a tiny bit of edible stuff in the shell, but you wouldn't want to eat the "feathers"! Worked for us! pat Tue Jul 10 08:23:30 -0700 2001 1375409 0 Pat Hammond 3 1375420 Pat, It is certainly not my intention to accuse you of fish-crime. Your conscience is clear and besides eating percebes out of season is neither a sin nor an impediment to attaining access to heaven,... as far as I know. Percebes are indeed available year round however they generally come from the Morroco's Atlantic coast where there are no restrictions on their capture and they are much cheaper and probably quite plentiful. They are on the other hand much smaller than their European cousins and not nearly as tasty. That being said the Spanish and the Portuguese are well known for their complete disregard to any law relating to agriculture and fisheries so it may well be that what you saw was indeed the autochthonous variety. More importantly, what did you drink with them? I think their saltiness and high iodine content lends them perfectly to the local Albariño grape used in vinho verde and the fantastic Rias Baixas wines of Galicia. Tue Jul 10 13:43:36 -0700 2001 1375414 0 Michael Lewis 4 1375425 I drank vinho verde at almost every meal. That was something else I was most anxious to try. And yes, it was perfect with the perceves. Pat Tue Jul 10 15:50:27 -0700 2001 1375420 0 Pat Hammond